This week, the Certification Commission for Health IT certified 10 ambulatory care electronic health record products based on its new 2008 criteria, Health Data Management reports.
CCHIT's 2008 criteria for EHR certification added 19 more requirements to the 200 requirements included in the 2007 standards (Health Data Management, 9/30). The new requirements include more extensive e-prescribing capabilities and the ability to send and receive continuity of care documents (Moore, Government Health IT, 10/1).
CCHIT officials said criteria and testing were updated to provide better assurance to physicians that the products will meet their functionality, interoperability and security needs (Manos, Healthcare IT News, 9/30).
Eight products that received full accreditation:
- Community Computer Service, MEDENT, version 18;
- eClinicalWorks, version 8;
- Epic Systems, EpicCare Ambulatory EMR, version spring 2008;
- Greenway Medical Technologies, PrimeSuite, Version 2008;
- McKesson Provider Technologies, Practice Partner version 9.3;
- MedLink International, MedLink TotalOffice, version 3.1;
- MedPlexus, Med Plexus EHR version 9.2; and
- NextGen Healthcare Information Systems, NextGen EMR, version 5.5.27.
Two products received pre-market conditional certification and will receive full certification once they are used at a physician office:
- Pulse Systems, Pulse Patient Relationship Management, version 4.1; and
- VIP Medicine LLC, SmartClinic, version 16 (Health Data Management, 9/30).